


Shaky Hands (part one of The Bear and the Slip in Time | Whumptober 2019 No.1)

by TheHirsch



Category: Dust And Ashes
Genre: Dust And Ashes: Universe A, Dust and Ashes AU, F/M, Original Character(s), TW: Violence, TW:death of a child, The Bear and A Slip In Time, Whump, no.1 - Freeform, tw: death of a loved one, whumptober2019
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-01
Updated: 2019-10-01
Packaged: 2020-11-09 05:13:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20848076
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheHirsch/pseuds/TheHirsch
Summary: Lo gets attacked by a bear, Natasha has to help her and nearly goes crazy.





	Shaky Hands (part one of The Bear and the Slip in Time | Whumptober 2019 No.1)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ladyspirkis4life97](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ladyspirkis4life97/gifts).

> This contains triggering content. This is not officially part of the Dust And Ashes story arc (Universe C), it's rather an alternative Universe. This story was requested by Ladyspirkis4life97.

-1st October 2051-

It was early in the morning, Lo was playing between the trees. The man on guard was reading a book. After a few hours, he had fallen asleep.  
There was movement in the bushes, Lo went there, maybe it was the cat from earlier that week. When she saw it her eyes when huge. It was a bear and it looked incredibly fluffy.  
“Hi, Teddy!” she called out and came closer, she was curious since the bear seemed to be huge.  
The bear eyed her, unsure what to think of the tiny human. Lo went to hug it, oh man, it was fluffy.  
The bear didn't like that, it felt threatened by the sudden movement it let out a roar and tossed the kid off of it. Lo flew a few meters.  
The guard had heard the bear and jumped up, ringing the alarm. John had heard it too and ran over, his gun out already. As soon as he saw the beast he fired, it took a few times to take it down. Then he noticed Lo laying there and he panicked. He ran over and scooped her up, not thinking.  
“Eloise?!” He called out and ran, he had to get her inside. He could feel that there were so many broken bones and there was a huge wound on the girl's back that was bleeding heavily.  
“Natasha!” He called out as he rushed up the wooden stairs. The horror was audible in his voice.  
Natasha ran to see what was going on, as soon as she saw the saggy body in John's arms and the blood on his shirt, she froze. A chill ran down her spine but she somehow managed to pull it together. She had to go into battle mode, she had to help Lo. She ran straight to the infirmary to prepare what she needed. She knew chances were bad, this was a basket case. It was nightmare material. Vera her younger daughter was laying in their bedroom, she had been sleeping and the sound of the alarm had woken her up. She was crying, but Natasha couldn't comfort her now. Lo first.  
Leslie, who had heard the commotion rushed into the infirmary just as John put down Eloise on the bed.  
“We gotta stop the bleeding,” Natasha said to Leslie, still not able to control her fear. “John, ventilate her. She still got a pulse.” Natasha meanwhile Was trying to stop the bleeding on Lo's back by pressing down at least a bit it needed to be fixed surgically, she knew that.  
“Leslie, take her under, John you need to keep ventilating her.” Meanwhile, she was trying to clamp all major arteries that had been ruptured. Natasha’s hands had never shaken like his before.  
The hustle went on, Natasha was struggling with everything she had to save her. She just had to.  
But a few hours later, Lo's little heart had stopped beating, even though everyone involved had done everything possible, there had been too much hemorrhage, even with blood transfusions from John it had not been enough. Too much stress for a little body like hers.  
Natasha was dead inside. She could not believe it, it had to be one of her crazy dreams. It just had to.  
“Natasha?” It was John's voice, it seemed to echo from the walls around them. He had been sent out as things had gotten too intense and Sandra had tried to help him calm down.  
Natasha felt how he wrapped his arms around her. She opened her eyes and looked at him, trying not to look at the body of her daughter that was covered in the once sterile, now bloodstained, cloth.  
“It’s gotta be a dream….” Natasha whispered.  
“Unfortunately it is not.” John felt like his insides were tied to a knot. He was still panicking.  
Leslie came and shoved the two out of the room. Nobody said anything. Except for Vera, who was crying down the hallway, probably while being with Kate, the mansion was silent.  
John had curled up in bed, the shirt he had worn earlier was laying on the floor. He had just told Leo. “Lo got hurt badly. She's now gone to a better place,” he had said.  
Natasha was laying on her back next to him, only in an undershirt and shorts, staring at the ceiling and clinging onto her husband's hand. Her face was expressionless but there were tears running down the sides of her face.  
This couldn't be true. I had to be a dream.  
She jumped a little as John moved a bit closer towards her to cover him with their blanket.  
He was not sure how exactly he could deal with this. Why had he not been faster? Why had he not been there watching her? His damn plants, he had been with his damn plants, but they were not worth her. They were not even remotely comparable to what was worth his daughter's life.  
Natasha, on the other hand, knew that she had fucked up again. Like back then with Dima. Now it was Lo, who had no fault in what had happened to her. Natasha had not tried hard enough. Her emotional involvement had ruined her work this time. She felt the urge to bang her head against something hard or maybe to punch a wall. She was tense and the picture of her lifeless daughter was coming up over and over again. What kind of parent even was she?  
John felt how she was and what her breathing pattern was doing. He took a deep breath to try and say something. “Thank you for doing your best work,” he said softly. “Thank you, for trying to help her. You did all you could. I was the parent in charge when it happened, my bad not yours.”  
Natasha turned her head to look him into the eye. “I could have done more. I— My hands were shaking.”  
John looked right back at her. “You did what you could. You did your best.”  
“No. I saved people far worse than her.”  
“Not under these conditions. You are amazing. I love you.”  
“No…. Just…. No. It is my bad. I should stop practising medicine.”  
John grabbed bother her hands and pulled himself closer to her. “Natasha Alexejevna, do you trust me?”  
Natasha looked back at him, she did trust him her life. But she also knew what he was going for. She had to be truthful. “I do trust you.”  
“Then trust me when I say that you did your best.”  
Natasha took a shaky breath and he could feel how she relaxed a bit. She turned on her side to face him fully and hugged onto him. “I'm scared.”  
“What are you scared off?”  
“This is real and could happen again.”  
“Tasha. The scary part is over. Everyone else is okay. The bear maybe not but nobody cares about him. Besides I was down there with her, I should have kept a closer eye on her.”  
“John that's not true. It is not your bad.” Natasha looked at him. Her face looked less like stone now. It seemed sad and tired, if not completely exhausted.

*** 

Leslie had prepped the body for burial. She wanted to do what Natasha and John wanted but not to put it on them. They were struggling enough.  
Vera was staying with Kate at least for the next couple of days, Kate was. After the first night which was the worst for Natasha, she seemed much more stable. She knew she had to keep going for John, Leo and Lo, for her dad and Kate and everyone else. She had responsibility. She had a vital task in the group, she was now even more aware of that.  
John, on the other hand, was sleighing down the hole. He had seemed calm on the day it happened but he was completely destroyed. He refused to eat and didn't get up from bed. It settled in and he was in deep emotional shock. He didn't say a word. He was trapped in his own thoughts and how guilty he felt about what had happened.  
Natasha was up and running. She was feeding Vera and cleaning up the remaining mess she had made the previous day. But she sat with John for the most part of the morning, holding his hand, attempting to comfort him. Well she was still fully there yet but she knew no matter what she had to make this world a better place for everyone alive. Leo was constantly around and walking through the hallways, he was unsure how to deal with it. He wanted to talk to Natasha but she had told him that John needed rest so he was waiting impatiently to come see him.  
Leo too needed comforting. He was scared he could lose even more of his family. Understandably.  
Natasha told him that she had no intention of going away. She made him pancakes since she knew that would cheer him up. Vera was mostly sleeping in the kangaroo wrap and going wherever Natasha was going. Though she didn't move much. She wanted to stay near John and Leo.  
Kate was constantly around Natasha she really didn't know how to deal with the situation, but she felt like she had to help Natasha if she would ask for it like she had kept an eye on Vera. She knew she would never have her own kids and Natasha was family to her so she could support her.  
Sandra was talking the guard all day since a part of the responsibly was his. The guard was terribly sorry. He did never think about how important his job actually was. But it was the end of the world and kicking him out of the group would most certainly kill him sooner or later.  
Leo went to play with her since it was a great distraction and she was an interesting person.  
When Natasha came back to their room she found the bed empty. John was gone, as were his boots and gun.  
Natasha bit back a curse and went to tell Sandra. She had to find him. She was worried. Sandra personally offered to come with her to look for him, so did Valerie. Kate took Vera again and the three women headed out. Dorian also came with them, since he was worried and he could be an enormous help with finding him.  
The guard on duty told them that John had left through the main gate. John had never learnt how to deal with grief properly. Back when his parents had died he had found distraction in working extra hours. Now there was nothing. The World they lived in was a world of death, war and danger. Only ten percent of Americans were still alive, the same for all Canadians in the denser populated areas. Until now he had been lucky, none of his close friends had died. He was desperate, there were pain and guilt. There was no way out.  
“I've got him!” Dorian called out.  
Natasha looked at the DRN.  
“I'll lead you all there.” Dorian started to walk a lot faster, but slowly enough that the other could keep up with the pace.  
They found John sitting on a rock, his head hung low.  
Natasha carefully approached him and sat down next to him but with some space in between them.  
“John. Talk to me.” She said softly and looked at him.  
He didn't react.  
“John….” she tried again and carefully reached out for his shoulder this time.  
John jumped at the touch and glared at her with eyes of anger, hate and sadness.  
“Go home,” he said.  
“If you come with me.”  
“I won't. But you really should go be with the kids and your dad.”  
“They need you too.”  
“They don't. I only get them killed. I'm a horrible dad.”  
“You are not. They need you, now more than ever. I need you too. You saved my life countless times, let me save yours. John, I want to get old with you. I know what you are thinking. Trust me I know.”  
John was only looking at her, he didn't say anything more.  
“I'm not saying I don't feel anything. I feel a lot. I just don't know how to put it into words and I know life has to go on. So many awful things happen. I miss her, John. I love her. But my children, my husband and everyone else in our group needs me. I have a responsibility. We need each other, John.”  
“How, Natasha? How can this happen?”  
“I do not know.” She reached for his hand. But he pulled away.  
“John, I love you.” She paused. “I'm sorry I'm saying this but not everything sucks. Life goes on. It has to. You are this group's leader, are you even aware of that?”  
John kept looking at his wife. “Come with me?”  
“No. Running away is not the solution. Besides, it is not actually saying that. John, please come back with me.” Natasha moved closer and hugged him tightly.  
His first instinct was to push her away but he could not hurt her, she was hurting already because of him.  
After a while, he slowly got up to walk back with her.  
Natasha wrapped an arm around her husband. She knew that he needed her now more than ever, she just could not let him go off the edge, both literally and figuratively. She would not let go. “I love you, John,” she said softly.  
“I love you too. I really do. It’s just…” John’s voice broke and fell silent.  
“What do you need?”  
“I need her back. I need a second chance.”  
Natasha started rubbing his back, not saying anything. This was not something she could make happen.  
The rest of the group followed them, none of them said anything, mostly because they were scared to say something wrong. Sandra was trying to keep the group together, especially since John (as the group’s leader) was barely up for the job.  
Dorian was constantly scanning, everyone and their surroundings. John was his friend, so was Natasha and he could not imagine how they must have felt like. Suddenly he froze. “We should hurry. There are planes approaching this area!”  
Natasha felt how John froze, how he tensed up a lot more.  
“It’s fine. If you hurry we will make it back in time. I got gear on me, so do the others, we shared one set before,” she gave him a bit of a shaky smile. She knew that sharing a set would suck.  
“Not a chance, you are still breastfeeding Vera,” John answered firmly.  
“I know you are caring for me. You always are, but you are also not yourself, let’s just run, okay?” Natasha turned around to the others. “Let’s hurry guys.”  
Dorian nodded. He would not be hurt by the rain but he was worried for his human companions. “We got ten minutes, tops.”  
Natasha reached for John’s hand and dragged him with her. She felt how he was not able to keep up with her. He had lost his will to fight.  
“Come on!” she called out. She would not leave him behind.  
They made it back to the mansion, just in time before the planes arrived. Dorian made sure the garden was covered and the building secure.  
Natasha went upstairs with John, Vera was babbling, Leslie was taking care of her. Leo had been with Valerie. He seemed to not understand it yet. Even to Natasha, it felt surreal.


End file.
